Systems for simulating operation of a vehicle are known in the art. Many such systems are based on mechanical models of the vehicle for which operation is to be simulated. For example, a mock-up of the interior of the vehicle is provided and is connected with various electronic and mechanical actuators. This allows the user to simulate operating the vehicle within a physical environment that looks and feels like the actual vehicle on which the simulation is based. One major drawback of systems based on mechanical models is cost, as designing, manufacturing, and maintaining mock-ups and the associated electronics and mechanics can be prohibitively expensive. As a consequence, simulations based on mechanical models that rely on mock-ups are not a feasible simulation option for conventional consumers.
Other systems for simulating operation of a vehicle have been proposed which do not rely on mechanical models and instead use an actual vehicle to conduct the simulation. While such systems may be more cost effective than systems based on mechanical models, other drawbacks are present. Firstly, the simulation of the vehicle operation relies solely on input from the vehicle controls of the actual vehicle, while most conventional vehicles lack any standard interface for such inputs or have no inputs at all. Secondly, the type of vehicle that can be simulated is limited to the actual vehicle type. As such, these types of simulation systems are fundamentally limited in the simulation scenarios they can present to the user.